One elementary defense measure resides in protective measures for the vehicle itself. The architecture of vehicles, as well as any passive ground protection mechanisms, make clearing of the vehicle more difficult when hit although the affect of hits on the vehicle and its troops are reduced. On the other hand, active protection systems include, for example, systems for reducing visibility and target acquisition by generating smoke and/or various kinds of fog (See DE 19936054 A1), and for reducing munitions affects such as provided by reactive armory (See DE 4440120 C2). These active protection systems are available for augmenting the ground protection mechanisms. However, countermeasures are often developed to thwart the protective measures provided by active protective systems. In particular, for example, as a measure used against reactive armor, missiles are known that can penetrate this kind of armor (See DE 19806066 A1). Thus, it is not always possible, depending on the actual quality of the threat, to always satisfactorily provide adequate protection for vehicles and their troops using available technology. One example of a threat that is especially difficult to provide adequate protection against is explosive traps built into the side of the road. In their simplest form, such booby traps comprise a large quantity of explosives that are detonated either by manual or remote control fuses upon passing by of a vehicle, or detonated automatically using a vehicle recognizing ignition mechanism (See DE 19827377 A1).
Controlled vehicles, unmanned and without troops, have the object of avoiding putting personnel into such threat scenarios. A disadvantage of controlled vehicles is that such vehicles cannot achieve a sufficient quality of autonomy using available technology, which severely limits the use of unmanned vehicles for military applications. Prior art remote controlled vehicles that are, for example, used in the clearing of ordinance (See DE 10215220 A1, DE 19614391 A1) often have the disadvantage that their control is inconvenient and expensive. Consequently, the application of these vehicles to situations that do not present a great threat does not make sense, from a practical standpoint.
Thus, the present invention has the object of providing a vehicle assembly system that can be applied both to manned and unmanned vehicles and that increases the survivability of troops in a ground vehicle in exceptionally dangerous situations. The object of the present invention is achieved using the concept of a vehicle train as will be described below.